How could'st thou find this dark sequester'd nook? 500 SPIRIT.

0 my lov'd master's heir, and his next joy, I came not here on such a trivial toy

As a stray'd ewe, or to pursue the stealth

Of pilfering wolf; not all the fleecy wealth

That doth enrich these downs, is worth a thought 505
To this my errand, and the care it brought.
But, O my virgin Lady, where is she?
How chance she is not in your company?
ELDER BROTHER.

To tell thee sadly, Shepherd, without blame,
Or our neglect, we lost her as we came.

SPIRIT.

Aye me unhappy! then my fears are true.

ELDER BROTHER.

What fears, good Thyrsis? Prythee briefly shew. SPIRIT.

I'll tell ye; 'tis not vain or fabulous

(Though so esteem'd by shallow ignorance)

510

What the sage poets, taught by th' heav'nly Muse, 515

500.-sequester'd nook?] Com- herd,] Sadly, soberly, seriously,

pare P. L. iv. 789.

Search thro' this garden, leave unsearch'd no nook.

Again, ix. 277.

As in a shady nook I stood behind. And sequestered occurs in the same application, P. L. iv. 706. In shadier bower, more sacred and sequester'd.

T. Warton.

as the word is frequently used by our old authors, and in Paradise Lost, vi. 541. where see the note.

512. What fears, good Thyrsis ?] He had written at first good Shep herd, but this was altered to good Thyrsis for variety, as he had just before addressed him by the name of Shepherd.

513. I'll tell ye;] In the Manuscript and edition of 1637 it is,

509. To tell thee sadly, Shep- I'll tell you.

Storied of old in high immortal verse,

Of dire chimeras and inchanted isles,

And rifted rocks whose entrance leads to hell;
For such there be, but unbelief is blind.

Within the navel of this hideous wood,
Immur'd in cypress shades a sorcerer dwells,
Of Bacchus and of Circe born, great Comus,
Deep skill'd in all his mother's witcheries,
And here to every thirsty wanderer

By sly enticement gives his baneful cup,

With many murmurs mix'd, whose pleasing poison
The visage quite transforms of him that drinks,
And the inglorious likeness of a beast

Fixes instead, unmoulding reason's mintage
Character'd in the face; this I have learnt
Tending my flocks hard by i' th' hilly crofts,

516.-dire chimeras] P. L. ii.

628.
Gorgons, and hydras, and chimeras
dire.

T. Warton. 520. Within the navel] That is, in the midst, a phrase borrowed from the Greeks and Latins.

523. Deep skill'd] He had writ ten at first Inur'd.

526. With many murmurs mix'd,] That is, in preparing this inchanted cup, the charm of many barbarous unintelligible words was intermixed, to quicken and strengthen its operation. Warburton.

530. Character'd in the face;] The word is often pronounced with this accent by our old writers. So Spenser, Faery Queen, b. iii. cant. 3. st. 14.

520

525

530

And writing strange charácters in the ground.

So Shakespeare, Two Gentlemen of Verona, act ii. s. 10.

Who art the table wherein all my thoughts

Are visibly charácter'd and ingrav'd.

And 2 Henry VI. act iii. s. 4.

Show me one scar charácter'd on thy skin.

530. So in his Divorce, b. i. Pref. "A law not only written "by Moses, but charactered in "us by nature.” Pr. W. i. 167. See Observat. Spenser's F. Q. ii. 162. T. Warton.

531.-i' th' hilly crofts,] He had written at first i' th' pastur'd lawns, which agrees not so well with what follows.

That brow this bottom glade, whence night by night
He and his monstrous rout are heard to howl

Like stabled wolves, or tigers at their prey,
Doing abhorred rites to Hecate

In their obscured haunts of inmost bowers.
Yet have they many baits, and guileful spells,
To' inveigle and invite th' unwary sense
Of them that pass unweeting by the way.
This evening late, by then the chewing flocks
Had ta'en their supper on the savoury herb
Of knot-grass dew-besprent, and were in fold,
I sat me down to watch upon a bank
With ivy canopied, and interwove

534. Like stabled wolves, or tigers at their prey,] This compari son in all probability was formed from what Virgil says of Circe's island, Æn. vii. 15.

535

540

542. Of knot-grass_dew-besprent,] This species of grass is mentioned in Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream, act iii. s. 7. And dew-besprent is sprinkled Hinc exaudiri gemitus, iræque leo- with dew. Spenser's Shepherd's

num

-ac formæ magnorum ululare lupo

rum:

Quos hominum ex facie Dea sæva potentibus herbis

Induerat Circe in vultus ac terga fe

rarum.

540. by then the chewing
flocks
Had ta'en their supper on the
savoury herb

The
supper of the sheep is from
a beautiful comparison in Spen-
ser, F. Q. i. i. 23.

Calendar, December,

My head besprent with hoary frost I find.

Fairfax, cant. 12. st. 101.

His silver locks with dust he foul besprent.

544. With ivy canopied, and

interwove

With flaunting honey-suckle,] Perhaps from Shakespeare, Mids. N. Dr. act ii. s. 2.

Quite over canopied with luscious woodbine.

With flaunting honey-suckle, and began,

Wrapt in a pleasing fit of melancholy,
To meditate my rural minstrelsy,

545

Till fancy had her fill, but ere a close
The wonted roar was up amidst the woods,
And fill'd the air with barbarous dissonance;
At which I ceas'd, and listen'd them a while,
Till an unusual stop of sudden silence
Gave respite to the drowsy flighted steeds,

Canopied, in the same applica-
tion, occurs also in Drayton,
Phineas Fletcher, Carew, and
Browne. See the note on inter-
wove, P. L. i. 621. T. Warton.

545. With flaunting honeysuckle,] It was at first spreading or blowing.

545. Milton therefore changed the epithets, which were simply descriptive, for one which ascribed to the plant an attribute of an animated, or even of a sentient, being. See note on P. R. i. 500. Mr. Warton refers to Lycidas 146, "well-attir'd woodbine," and 40, "the gadding vine." And the same remark applies to these epithets, and to several others near them, cowslips wan," "joyous leaves," &c. E.

547. To meditate my rural minstrelsy,] We have the expression "rural minstrelsy" in Browne's Pastorals, b. i. s. i. p. 2. and in the Eclogues of Brooke and Davies, Lond. 1614; but the whole context is Virgil's "Syl

"vestrem tenui musam meditaris 66 arena," Bucol. i. 2. As in Lycidas, 66.

meditate the thankless musc. Close, in the next line, is a mu

550

sical close on his pipe. See the note on the Ode on the Nativity, 100. T. Warton.

553.-the drowsy flighted steeds, That draw the litter of close curtain'd sleep;]

So I read drowsy-flighted according to Milton's Manuscript; and this genuine reading Dr. Dalton has also preserved in Comus. Drowsy-frighted is nonsense, and manifestly an error of the press in all the editions. There can be no doubt that in this passage Milton had his eye upon the following description of night in Shakespeare, 2 Henry VI. act iv. s. 1.

And now loud howling wolves arouse
the jades,

That drag the tragic melancholy night,
Who with their drowsy, slow, and
flagging wings
Clip dead men's graves

The idea and the expression of
drowsy-flighted in the one are
plainly copied from their drowsy,
slow, and flagging wings in the
other: and Fletcher in the
Faithful Shepherdess has much
the same image, act iv.

Night, do not steal away: I woo

That draw the litter of close-curtain'd sleep; At last a soft and solemn breathing sound